Unearthing an Unexpected Musical TreasureMitch Myers made an intriguing discovery while poking around his late uncle's archives — a container of old tapes labeled as Gram Parsons demos. But the search for the recordings' origins took Myers in an unexpected direction.

'This Land Is Your Land' - Woody Guthrie

When children's author and songwriter Shel Silverstein died in 1999, Mitch Myers was put in charge of organizing his uncle's archives. In the process, Myers made an intriguing discovery — a container of old reel-to-reel tapes. Two tape boxes were labeled "Graham Parsons - Demos" (with the singer's first name misspelled).

The old tapes Myers found were potentially a big deal. Before his death in 1973, Gram Parsons helped move The Byrds toward country music, and was a prime mover on their album, Sweetheart of the Rodeo.

Myers started calling people familiar with Parsons' musical history. He soon determined that the tapes could have been from the summer of 1964, when Parsons and one of his earliest groups, The Shilohs, did some demo recordings in Manhattan with folk singer Dick Weissman. The main clue was that Weissman's name was listed on the tape boxes along with Parsons'.

Myers' search for the origin of the tapes took him in an unexpected direction.